Personal Finance News Monday 10/8

Phil's Personal Finance Tip of the Day:

The Myth of the Black Friday Deal
By DANA MATTIOLI/The Wall Street Journal October 8, 2012, 10:59 a.m. ET

Attention Black Friday shoppers: You're probably wasting your time.

After crunching two to six years' worth of pricing data for a number of typical holiday gifts, The Wall Street Journal has turned up the best times to go deal hunting — and they almost never involve standing in the freezing cold all night.

It turns out that gifts from Barbie dolls to watches to blenders are often priced below Black Friday levels at various times throughout the year, even during the holiday season, and their prices follow different trajectories as the remaining shopping days tick down.

Watches and jewelry, typical last-minute quarry for well-heeled shoppers, get more expensive as the season progresses, according to Decide Inc., the consumer-price research firm that gathered and analyzed the data for this article. Blenders, which might sit around for months if they aren't bought in the holiday window, get much cheaper at the end.

To read the entire article from The Wall Street Journal:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390443615804578042700772445448.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_LEFTTopStories


Scripture of the Day from Dave Ramsey.com:
2 Corinthians 3:2–3 — You yourselves are our letter, written on our hearts, known and read by everyone. You show that you are a letter from Christ, the result of our ministry...not on tablets of stone but on tablets of human hearts.

Please listen to the Dave Ramsey show live on WOR 710 from 2-4 PM EST. You can also listen to the 3rd hour 4-5 PM EST. at Dave Ramsey.com.

Personal Finance News Saturday 10/6

Phil's Personal Finance Tip of the Day:

Winners thrive on competition
September 27, 2012 By Harvey Mackay

I hate to lose.

That said, I am proud to admit that competition has made me a better businessman, a better golfer and a better person. And when there isn’t another company or business to compete with, I try to outdo myself. If that sounds simple, well, it is. I always want to be at my best and show my best side.

People can exceed expectations when motivated properly. This story, told by Andrew S. Grove, former CEO of the Intel Corporation, the California manufacturer of semiconductors, is a perfect illustration.

For years the performance of the Intel facilities maintenance group, which is responsible for keeping their buildings clean and in good shape, was sub-standard. No amount of pressure or inducement seemed to do any good.

Then Intel initiated a program in which each building’s upkeep was periodically given a score by a resident senior manager. The score was then compared with those given the other buildings. Result:

The condition of all of the buildings improved dramatically – almost immediately. Nothing else had been done. People did not get more money or other rewards. What they did get was the stimulus of competition.

Competition drives performance. It drives people to work harder and dig down deeper to deliver more than they ever thought they could.

Among the many benefits of increased market competition according to the tutor2u website are:

1. Lower prices for consumers.
2. A greater discipline on producers/suppliers to keep their costs down.
3. Improvements in technology with positive effects on production methods and costs.
4. A greater variety of products from which to choose.
5. A faster pace of invention and innovation.
6. Improvements to the quality of service for consumers.
7. Better information for consumers, allowing people to make more informed choices.

To read the entire article from Harvey Mackay.com:
http://harveymackay.com/column/winners-thrive-on-competition/

Mackay’s Moral: If you go the extra mile, you will almost always beat the competition.

Personal Finance News Friday 10/5

Phil's Personal Finance Tip of the Day:

Your right to resell your own stuff is in peril
By Jennifer Waters | MarketWatch – Thu, Oct 4, 2012 11:34 AM EDT

CHICAGO (MarketWatch) — Tucked into the U.S. Supreme Court’s busy agenda this fall is a little-known case that could upend your ability to resell everything from your grandmother’s antique furniture to your iPhone 4.

At issue in Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons is the first-sale doctrine in copyright law, which allows you to buy and then sell things like electronics, books, artwork and furniture as well as CDs and DVDs, without getting permission from the copyright holder of those products.

A Supreme Court case could limit the resale of goods made overseas but sold in America.

Under the doctrine, which the Supreme Court has recognized since 1908, you can resell your stuff without worry because the copyright holder only had control over the first sale.

Put simply, though Apple has the copyright on the iPhone and Mark Owen does on the book “No Easy Day,” you can still sell your copies to whomever you please whenever you want without retribution.

That’s being challenged now for products that are made abroad and if the Supreme Court upholds an appellate court ruling it would mean that the copyright holders of anything you own that has been made in China, Japan or Europe, for example, would have to give you permission to sell it.

“It means that it’s harder for consumers to buy used products and harder for them to sell them,” said Jonathan Bland, an adjunct professor at Georgetown University Law Center, who filed a friend-of-the-court brief on behalf of the American Library Association, the Association of College and Research Libraries and the Association for Research Libraries. “This has huge consumer impact on all consumer groups.”

Another likely result is that it would hit you financially because the copyright holder would now want a piece of that sale.

It could be your personal electronic devices or the family jewels that have been passed down from your great-grandparents who immigrated from Spain. It could be a book that was written by an American writer but printed and bound overseas or an Italian painter’s artwork.

It has implications for a variety of wide-ranging U.S. entities including libraries, musicians, museums and even resale juggernauts eBay and Craigslist. U.S. libraries, for example, carry some 200 million books from foreign publishers.

To read the entire article from Jennifer Waters | MarketWatch:
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/resell-own-stuff-peril-040302428.html

Inspirational Quotes@Inspire_Us from Twitter:
You will never do anything in this world without courage. It is the greatest quality of the mind next to honor. -Aristotle

 

Personal Finance News Thursday 10/4

Phil's Personal Finance Tip of the Day:

Legitimate work-at-home opportunities via social media
From Clark Howard.com

Posted: 6:00 a.m. Thursday, Oct. 4, 2012

Your average social media user is now able to get paid for posting product links in what's amounting to a new area of growth in online retailing.

The New York Times reports websites like Beso.com and Refer.ly will pay you for essentially doing your own advertorials and telling others on Facebook, Pinterest, or Twitter about what it is you're out there buying.

As you might imagine, this is very popular among women who are posting about shoes, dresses, and other fashion items.

There are also apps for this sort of thing like Pose, available for smart phones and tablets. With Pose, you set up your own online fashion magazine and if people buy from it, you get a commission.

To read the entire article from Clark Howard.com:
http://www.clarkhoward.com/news/clark-howard/shopping-retail/legitimate-work-home-opportunities-social-media/nSSXZ/

Please listen to the Clark Howard show 1-3PM ET Monday to Friday:
http://www.clarkhoward.com/

Inspirational Quotes@Inspire_Us from Twitter:
We cannot become what we need to be by remaining what we are. -Max De Pree

Personal Finance News Wednesday 10/3

Phil's Personal Finance Tip of the Day:

13 Ways Americans Throw Away Money
By Jill Krasny, Gus Lubin and Shlomo Sprung | Business Insider – Mon, Oct 1, 2012 12:33 PM EDT

Blame the government or blame the economy, but Americans should also blame themselves for their declining net worth. We waste a whole lot of money. Seriously, over half a trillion dollars.

This list is based on estimates due to limited available data, and the true total is surely higher. We included things like cigarettes and gambling, even though some would claim they are are worth their cost. This is a personal finance site after all, and these are costs you can cut.

To read the entire article from Business Insider:
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/13-ways-americans-throw-away-money.html


Scripture of the Day from Dave Ramsey.com:
2 Corinthians 2:14 — But thanks be to God, who always leads us as captives in Christ's triumphal procession...

Please listen to the Dave Ramsey show live on WOR 710 from 2-4 PM EST. You can also listen to the 3rd hour 4-5 PM EST. at Dave Ramsey.com.

Personal Finance News Tuesday 10/2

Phil's Personal Finance Tip of the Day:

10 Common Credit Myths That Could Be Costing You Money
By Erik Carter | Forbes – 22 hours ago

Managing credit is one of the most common subjects that I’ve been getting asked about lately.

Perhaps it’s because so many had their credit scores damaged during the recession and are now trying to improve them in order to qualify for the record low mortgage rates we’ve been seeing. In addition, employers have increasingly been using credit scores to evaluate applicants and especially in this job market, every little factor really counts. So regardless of your motivation to increase your credit score, here are some of the most common credit myths I’ve heard that could be hurting your score:

1) I haven’t done anything wrong so my credit is fine. Even if you’ve done everything right, your credit could still be in trouble. That’s because 70% of credit reports have errors on them. In the likelihood that you have one of them, you could be paying more in interest than you need to be.

2) If I check my credit report, it will hurt my score. Checking your own report generally doesn’t hurt your score but errors do so don’t let this be an excuse not to do it.

3) I’ve checked my credit report and there are no errors so I don’t have anything to worry about. You actually have 3 credit reports (from Experian, Equifax, and TransUnion) so if you’ve only checked one, there’s still a chance that errors on one of the others is hurting you.

4) I can check my credit reports for free at freecreditreport.com. First, many sites like this only give you access to one report, which is from Experian in this case. Second, freecreditreport.com ironically isn’t exactly free. It’s one of many copycat sites that charges you a fee to see your credit report and then charges you a monthly fee unless you cancel within a short period of time. Instead, you’ll want to go to annualcreditreport.com, which allows you truly free access to each of your credit reports once every 12 months.

To read the entire article from Erik Carter | Forbes:
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/10-common-credit-myths-that-could-be-costing-you-money.html 

Scripture of the Day from Dave Ramsey.com:
Habakkuk 2:3 — For the revelation awaits an appointed time; it speaks of the end and will not prove false.

Please listen to the Dave Ramsey show live on WOR 710 from 2-4 PM EST. You can also listen to the 3rd hour 4-5 PM EST. at Dave Ramsey.com.

Personal Finance News Monday 10/1

Phil's Personal Finance Tip of the Day:

17 Steps to Make Your Money Last a Lifetime
By Kimberly Palmer | U.S.News & World Report LP – Fri, Sep 28, 2012 12:51 PM EDT

Living to 100 is expensive, but taking time to run through this annual checklist will help you afford it. Here are 17 steps to a more secure financial life:

All ages:

-- Analyze your spending over the last month to see where your money is going and where you might be able to cut back to add more to your savings. Many banks offer free money tracking through online accounts, and money-tracking tools such as Mint.com make it easier to follow the dollars, too.
-- Calculate how much money you want to have saved before you retire (online calculators can help). For a shortcut, multiply your current annual salary by 12. Figure out how close you are to reaching that goal and what needs to change, such as working longer or saving more, to reach it.
-- Check up on the investment fees you are currently paying through your retirement accounts and consider whether it makes sense to shift into lower-fee funds.
-- Make sure you are taking advantage of all tax breaks available to you. Retirement savings accounts such as 401(k)s and IRAs offer a variety of tax advantages. Check with your human resources department to see if there are any employee benefits you're not taking advantage of.
-- Balance your portfolio once a quarter to make sure it reflects your current age and ideal risk level. For a 30-something, that might mean 70 percent in stocks and 30 percent in bonds and other, more-conservative securities. For a 60-something, it might mean the reverse combination.
-- Explore lifestyle changes that could boost your personal savings rate. Does it make sense to live with other family members in a cross-generational household? Will it make sense to do so in the future?

20s and 30s:
-- Write a will, and also consider creating durable power of attorney and healthcare proxy documents.
-- Make sure you have an appropriate amount of life insurance, especially if family members depend on your income.
-- Increase your savings rate over time until you reach your goal percentage. For a 20-something without a pension, the goal percentage might be 20 percent of one's income. Automate savings through your bank accounts or paycheck.
-- Minimize the amount of debt that you carry, especially high-interest debt, such as credit card debt.

If you do carry such debt, make a plan to aggressively pay it off.

To read the entire article from Kimberly Palmer | U.S.News & World Report LP:
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/17-steps-money-last-lifetime-143148408.html


Inspirational Quotes@Inspire_Us from Twitter:

In this life we cannot always do great things. But we can do small things with great love. -Mother Teresa